I’m a serial procrastinator. I always have been. My Dad always said to me “Always put off what you can easily do today, tomorrow might be too late, right, Chaz?” In the past few years I’ve made leaps and bounds in learning not to fall into the traps so easily afforded by instant gratification at the sacrifice of work, but it’s always a work in progress.
Like a fine chianti with spaghetti, my procrastination also pairs well with a fear of success. At least, that’s how I’ve always defined it. I have had some great ideas and written some great business plans, but just when I’m about to hit the button and let the ideas live, I freeze. I don’t know why.
I’ve been going to therapy for years now for various things in my life, the two aforementioned issues included, and I have spoken with her about this at length. But I had a revelation in the car this morning: I don’t have a fear of success, I have a fear of the responsibility of success. I’ve always said, what if I can’t meet demands? What if I dissapoint my customers? What if my great idea isn’t as great as it seems? Well, my therapist had a good point: “So what?” It’s been said before that you learn more from your mistakes than your successes, so I should embrace those possible stumbles and falls and take them as a learning opportunity.
What seems like an obvious correlation in writing never really connected in my head and how it feels like I’ve just dropped a medicine ball I never knew I was holding. Being a freelancer in the design and advertising business obviously requires a great deal of responsibility, as does living on your own and being independent, but taking on a responsibility for other peoples’ satisfaction is never something I considered, nor wanted, admittedly. Of course, this is unavoidable in the my business and being an entrepreneur.
Now that I’ve identified the problem, I can lay to rest many of my insecurities, throw those hurdles to the sidelines, move ahead with my life and career, and stop putting my great ideas on the back-burner.